After a shaky start to one of the premiership favourites in the Saturday night clash at the Telstra Dome it was the Saints who defeated the Blues by a convincing 40 points.
The Blues got out of the blocks early and kicked the first 4 goals for the match and were looking to go into the quarter time break with a nice lead but late goals kicked by Fraser Gehrig and Jason Gram that narrowed the quarter time margin to 11 points.
After the break St Kilda quickly hit the lead with the first four goals for the quarter which included 2 from former Geelong ruckman, Steven King. St Kilda dominated the second quarter but the skill wasn’t there as we’ve seen in the past. Going into the long break St Kilda lead by 13 points.
It was after the half time break that St Kilda really put their foot down and got away from the Blues, three late goals kicked by Carlton in junk time eased the scoreboard pain a little. Both Fraser Gehrig and Stephen Milne kicked for goals apiece while Xavier Clarke chipped in with three goals. Jarrad Waite kept Nick Reiwoldt to only two goals for the match, one of which was the result of a free kick given by Heath Scotland.
ST KILDA: 2.5, 8.7, 12.9, 19.11 (125)
CARLTON: 4.4, 6.6, 6.10, 12.13 (85)
GOALS
St Kilda: Gehrig 4, Milne 4, X Clarke 3, King 2, Riewoldt 2, Schneider 2, Gram, Blake
Carlton: Fevola 2, Fisher 2, Murphy, Hampson, Edwards, Pfeiffer, Houlihan, Bannister, Stevens, Betts
BEST
St Kilda: Montagna, X Clarke, Gram, Hayes, Ball, Fisher
Carlton: Murphy, Gibbs, Thornton, Betts, Houlihan, Waite
INJURIES
St Kilda: Nil
Carlton: Nil
Reports: Nil
Umpires: Head, Ellis, Keating
Crowd: 43,396 at Telstra Dome
